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Documents regarding the care of the "Ocracoke Ponies" at Cape Hatteras National Seashore

H..J. RKYXOLDS TOBACCO COMPANY
A/irvSTO\ SAl.EM NOW'1 CAROLINA
February 25, 1965
Mr. William P. Saunders, Director
North Carolina Department of
Conservation and Development
Raleigh, North Carolina
Dear Bill:
Today I had a visit from Mr. and Mrs. Rondthaler of
Ocracoke about the pony situation.
There are two fundamental questions involved here
which I will answer from my point of view, and then document
the case. (1) Are the ponies worth keeping? Yes, indeed.
(2) Who is goings to take them over? I think the Federal Park
Service should, although there is room for compromise between
the Park Service and the state in this latter question.
The ponies have been kept for many years as a great
attraction by Mrs. Rondthaler and Sam Jones, the latter being
a Norfolk man with a great civic interest in Ocracoke.
Somehow,, a fence of considerable proportions has been
built along the south side, the Sound side, north of Ocracoke.
It takes some doing to maintain it. The C & D originally gave
the Ocracoke Boy Scouts $500 a year to feed the ponies in the
wintertime. They did it somewhat cheaper, and Mrs. Rondthaler
volunteered to have it cut to $300. Last year it cost $540,
and the local citizens made up the difference. There are only
twenty-five of the ponies left and nominally they belong to the
Boy Scout Council, but they are now leased to the State of
North Carolina, the Attorney General, or somebody having ruled
that their palates were not eligible for oats furnished by the
state if the state did not own them.
I never knew anything about this until the other day
when Miriam mentioned to me how important maintaining this herd

H..J. RKYXOLDS TOBACCO COMPANY
A/irvSTO\ SAl.EM NOW'1 CAROLINA
February 25, 1965
Mr. William P. Saunders, Director
North Carolina Department of
Conservation and Development
Raleigh, North Carolina
Dear Bill:
Today I had a visit from Mr. and Mrs. Rondthaler of
Ocracoke about the pony situation.
There are two fundamental questions involved here
which I will answer from my point of view, and then document
the case. (1) Are the ponies worth keeping? Yes, indeed.
(2) Who is goings to take them over? I think the Federal Park
Service should, although there is room for compromise between
the Park Service and the state in this latter question.
The ponies have been kept for many years as a great
attraction by Mrs. Rondthaler and Sam Jones, the latter being
a Norfolk man with a great civic interest in Ocracoke.
Somehow,, a fence of considerable proportions has been
built along the south side, the Sound side, north of Ocracoke.
It takes some doing to maintain it. The C & D originally gave
the Ocracoke Boy Scouts $500 a year to feed the ponies in the
wintertime. They did it somewhat cheaper, and Mrs. Rondthaler
volunteered to have it cut to $300. Last year it cost $540,
and the local citizens made up the difference. There are only
twenty-five of the ponies left and nominally they belong to the
Boy Scout Council, but they are now leased to the State of
North Carolina, the Attorney General, or somebody having ruled
that their palates were not eligible for oats furnished by the
state if the state did not own them.
I never knew anything about this until the other day
when Miriam mentioned to me how important maintaining this herd